We Owned The Night
by quotegilikay
Summary: Five years ago, Dean had a one night stand with a guy in a pub. A blue-eyed, dark-haired guy. Now, he's happily married, but he still thinks about that night. And he wonders if the other guy does too.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N- **I spent most of today in a room by myself entering stock-horse-challenge scores into a computer and listening to my iPod. Lady Antebellum came on, and this happened.

* * *

_Do you remember when,_

_We woke under a blanket, _

_All tangled up in skin._

_Not knowin' in that moment,_

_We'd never speak again._

- We Owned The Night, Lady Antebellum

* * *

When he was 23, Dean had a bad day at work. A seriously bad day. He'd woken up severely hung-over from a friend's party the night before, and because he'd already used up all his sick days he came to work with a headache to rival the one that he'd had when a mate had dropped a full drum of oil on his head (and quite frankly, he'd been lucky to survive that) when he was 17, and a temper to match. He'd argued with a cranky client, ended up giving them the finger and saying something very insulting about said customer's sister, mother, and grandmother, and then gotten fired. He'd packed up his grubby little desk, tried to take a sticky-tape holder that apparently he wasn't entitled to, and a… scuffle… had ensued in which he got a staple through his finger and a bleeding nose. So he'd left, without the sticky-tape, and driven home, swearing all the way at everything that irritated him, from the bitch-ass driver who'd cut him off at an orange light to the bird that alighted briefly on his hood to the DJ's shitty-ass choice of music.

Then he'd gone to the bar and gotten absolutely piss-blind-drunk.

He'd woken up the next morning with another killer-whale headache and a man in his bed.

He'd made a yelping sound, tried to move, and nearly fell out of bed because his legs were tangled like tree roots with the other man's. After the initial surprise had passed, he'd waited for something else to set in. Disgust, maybe. He wasn't homophobic, per se, but he'd had it pretty firmly ingrained in him from a young age that being anything less than perfectly straight was not a thing to be proud of.

But it never came.

And as he lay there, naked as the day he was born and tangled up under a sheet with another, also naked, man, something of the previous night had come back to him. Only flashes, shades of emotion and impressions and senses and while it certainly wasn't the most gentle night of loving he'd ever experienced, there was something about it that had felt… Dean couldn't quite put his finger on it, but whatever it was, it panicked him.

That was also when he realised that he wasn't in his own bed. He wasn't sure why it had taken him so long- these sheets were much nicer than his at home- but it calmed him down a little bit because at least he could run from someone else's place. To run from your own place was somewhat more difficult, and then coming back again evoked… memories, things that had to be cleared up and dealt with when he'd much rather just leave them behind.

So he got up, and left the dark-haired stranger asleep, picking up his clothes from the floor (_all over_ the floor. And the top of the cupboard and the chest-of-draws/desk thing too) and yanking them on as he made his way to the door.

He was 28 now, married to a red-haired and wicked-smiled girl called Jill, with a much better job than he'd had back then and generally a much better life.

He was happy. Really, he was.

But sometimes he woke up in the middle of the night, flashes of blue eyes and dark tousled hair swirling through his mind in a whirl of heat and skin, slightly-slightly-awkward limbs and tight wiry muscles.

Sometimes he thought a lot about that nameless stranger with the wry smile and soulful blue eyes.

Sometimes he thought a lot about him, and he wondered if maybe, just maybe, he thought of Dean sometimes too.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N- **I've had some requests that I continue this. (read: one person suggested I do another chapter. Thank you **nannily**! I do not take a lot of convincing.) So here it is!

Also thankyou to the couple of guests who reviewed

And there'll be one more chapter after this.

Castiel Novak wasn't exactly the type of guy to have one night stands. It wasn't like he was much of a serial-monogamist all-in-life-long kind of guy either; honestly, he wasn't all that fond of relationships in general. But he'd been raised in a Christian family with fairly high moral standards, and while he'd formed his own moral code over the years, he'd still never gotten into the whole using-people-for-meaningless-sex thing. He didn't like the general type of people who slept with six people in a week; he didn't like the awkward morning-after conversations; and he didn't like the circumstances in which one-night-stand-type connections were formed- namely, pubs, and alcohol. He didn't like pubs because they were too noisy and too smelly and filled with people who were too noisy and too smelly, and he didn't like alcohol because he'd seen what it had done to his best friend.

He was only in town for three days. Two nights. He'd arrived that afternoon after a horrible all-day drive, and he'd been nervous as hell about his meeting tomorrow- at 24, he may have been the youngest person in the history of his marketing firm to ever hold his particular position, but that didn't mean he was the child-protégé-genius-kid that his older brother Gabriel was always accusing of being. He had to make a good impression on this client, and it was making him tense and edgy.

So he'd decided to find a bar, have a couple of drinks to settle his nerves.

The place he'd found himself in was everything he hated about pubs all rolled into one. Too-loud and terrible music; dim, shadowy lighting; TV blaring out football results behind the bar with a bunch of drunken yobbos clustered around it shouting encouragement at players who couldn't hear them; and blanketing it all the stench of cheap booze and desperation and general uncleanliness.

He'd sat at the bar and down drink after drink, not even paying attention to what he was ingesting, until after a while he found himself doing tequila shots with a random guy he'd met ten seconds ago.

When he looked back at the night, sitting down on that stool was the last clear thing in his head.

The rest of it was a mess, a blur of fiery heat and tanned skin, stupidly green eyes and sinfully amazing wet tongues and calloused hands.

He'd woken up the next morning in his motel room, with a stabbing pain above both his ears and both his eyes and almost-cool-again and very empty sheets beside him, naked as a hairless cat and a little bit cold.

He'd gotten out of bed slowly, the headache affecting his equilibrium more than it probably should, and gathered his clothes and gone off to have a shower.

Reflecting as the hot water dripped down his back, he was glad that the other man had gone. Relieved. It meant that he didn't have to face the awkwardness of the morning, that inevitable explanation that he didn't do that, he never did that, and it had all been a massive mistake. It meant that he could chalk it all up to bad judgement and try to pretend it didn't happen.

It was a mistake. It had been nothing more than a simple bad call. But then what had it been about this man with the greenest green eyes he'd ever seen that had every one of his carefully-constructed principles flying out the window?

As Castiel sat through his meeting that afternoon (which was fine- going to the bar to make himself stop thinking about it had worked better than he'd hoped or expected), _things _had kept coming back to him. Darkness and whispers, sheets pulled over heads and sculpted chests and roaming hands.

And he'd kept thinking about it, even now. Five years later. Five years, and he still thought about that night every time he smelt that pub smell or caught sight of insanely green eyes, even if it had all just been a mistake.

And sometimes he wondered if that sandy-haired stranger ever thought of him too.

**A/N2- **So there you go.

Is yobbos an Australian word? Idek.

Third part will be up tomorrow. Promise.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N- **Never make promises. You'll only dig yourself into a hole when you can't keep them.

Philosophies from Gili.

* * *

She'd chucked him out. Dumped him. Asked for a divorce.

However you want to put it.

It all boiled down to one thing- Dean Winchester and Jill McGrath were not married anymore.

All because he'd said he didn't want kids. She did, and she'd yelled at Dean that he'd known that he married her, that he'd always known that.

He'd known no such thing.

It had started from something so stupid, from being in bed and her whispering to him that maybe they should start trying for a family. He'd said that he didn't want kids, he'd never wanted kids, and then it had escalated into a nasty, insult-slinging, every-problem-we've-ever-had fight. The fact that her mother didn't like him, that his father thought he could do better. The fact that he couldn't hold down a decent job and that she was stuck supporting them both. The fact that she wanted to live in Europe and travel around the world but she hadn't because he wouldn't get on that plane.

And then he'd said to her that maybe they shouldn't be together then, if they were just so incompatible, and she'd said fine, why didn't he leave?

He'd snapped that he would, and that she'd see him in a couple of days when he came to collect the rest of his things.

He went back to the pub, the one he'd mostly avoided for six years.

Castiel was back in town for another meeting. He wasn't nervous this time- these meetings were so commonplace by now that they didn't even faze him- but he had a couple of hours to kill and he found himself in the same pub he'd visited six years ago.

He walked through the door, the dust-and-beer-and-sweat smell assaulting his nostrils as soon as he entered. The layout had changed since the last time he'd been there- he didn't have the world's best memory but he was pretty sure he'd remember that heinous pot plant in the corner; the bar had been along the other wall; and the vinyl upholstery in the booths used to be a cracked and peeling dark blue, not shiny and red like it was now. He dodged through the crowd around the TV on his way to the bar- some of the grizzly old drunks were probably the same ones who'd been there last time, Castiel thought ruefully.

He slid onto a bar stool at the end of the counter, hooking his ankles around the footrests.

Dean took a table at the back, and sat there, nursing his glass of scotch.

He was wallowing. There was no other way to word it and Dean couldn't even be bothered trying to deny that he was sulking anymore.

He was angry at Jill for starting the fight, himself for letting it escalate, and their never-would-be-born kids for being the cause. He was sad, too, upset, because what he'd had with Jill had been the best thing in his life for three years now, and the end of it had been more than a shock.

Generally, he was miserable, and as he sat there, swallowing mouthful after mouthful of scotch, his blame grew broader and broader until it covered relationships in general. His thoughts turned to the future, and the thought of yet-to-come relationships made his head pound and his stomach turn unpleasantly.

He heaved a heavy sigh, stood up, and made his way up to the bar.

Castiel caught the bartender's attention, and ordered a whiskey.

He sighed deeply, and sat with his head in his hands. He had a bad feeling that it had been a mistake coming here. He was feeling depressed about the fact that his life hadn't really changed that much since the last time he'd been here. He was nostalgic about those days at the same time, days when he'd enjoyed his job and he hadn't come home too late every night resenting his office and his co-workers and generally wishing he was somewhere else.

He needed a change; a new job, a new home, even just a holiday. But Castiel Novak was a creature of habit. He liked his routine, his day-in-day-out schedules, solid and reliable. He didn't like stepping out of his comfort zone, and he didn't like change. No matter how much he might need a change, a life overhaul of sorts, it was something he didn't really want and something he was reluctant to instigate.

He caught the eye of the bartender for another drink, and someone bumped into him from behind. He turned around, annoyed…

… and that was when Dean found himself faced with a pair of very familiar blue eyes that he'd only seen once before.

'Oh my God.' He breathed softly. 'It's you…'

Then he winced, wondering if he could just get up and run right now before the man said anything, because what was he going to say if he asked how he knew him? _We had sex once, six years ago._

Right. Because that wasn't in any way creepy. Or weird.

But the man was looking at Dean with the exact same expression.

'I remember you.' Castiel just barely above a whisper. 'You were…' He trailed off, unsure of what to say. The green eyes he was looking into right now were the same ones that had been haunting his dreams for the past six years, and he suddenly felt a spring of something akin to hope in his chest. Here, maybe, was the change he needed.

The man was everything Dean remembered. The blue eyes, the just-got-out-of-bed hair, the chapped lips. Well, he couldn't be sure of everything, his brain informed him wickedly. His face, at least.

Castiel eyed the man in front of him. He was solidly built, with a rugged, working-class look about him. He had wide calloused hands (which Castiel definitely remembered), and when he spoke his voice was broad and friendly, all dropped gs and slipped ts.

They stood there staring at each other, frozen, for at least a full minute, and then Dean spoke.

'Uhh… I'm, uh…' He trailed off, his usual confidence deserting him. He cleared his throat and tried again. 'I'm, uh… Dean.' He mumbled, slightly pathetically.

'Castiel.' The man said absently, his eyes roaming across Dean's chest.

'So you remember me?' Dean said, feeling some of his coolness return. 'I was that good, huh?' He joked.

Castiel gave a quick quirk of his lips. 'You remembered me, too, so you can't have had any complaints either.'

Dean blushed, and inwardly cursed those damn blue eyes and his own pale skin. He pushed the feeling down. 'So.' He started. 'I remember you. You remember me. Obviously that night had a pretty big effect on both of us.' He paused. 'Do you want to do it again?' Dean said, his eyes sparkling.

But Castiel surprised him by shaking his head. 'No.'

Dean started. He was absolutely not used to being rejected. 'But you said…'

'I don't want meaningless sex, Dean.' Castiel said sharply. He thought fast. He wondered about the intelligence or otherwise of saying what he was about to say; it was a game move, but one he wanted to take. He was sick of being cautious.

He started to go on but Dean interrupted him. 'Meaningless? I am not meaningless, Cas.' He protested jokily.

'Seriously.' Castiel fixed him with the most intense stare Dean had ever seen. He squirmed just slightly. 'I want more. If we do this, I want you to still be there when I wake up.'

They stared at each other for a full minute, Dean weighing Cas's proposal in his mind.

He didn't want another relationship. Not so soon after this thing with Jill. He didn't want to go through all that again, to open himself up to those sorts of feelings again. He needed some time to gather himself, recollect his thoughts, give himself time to process and adjust to everything he'd just been through. Regroup. It would take someone fairly special to break that promise he'd made to himself. And this guy was just someone he'd met in a bar.

But if he was nothing special, why had he had Dean thinking about him almost every night for the past six years?

Cas just stared evenly at Dean. His mind was made up, firmly set, and he was slightly nervous about what Dean would say and if he'd just made a huge mistake, but he held his ground.

And then Dean shrugged, and smiled. Might as well give it a try, right?

'Yeah, OK.'

* * *

**A/N- **I was thinking while I was typing this up that it would have been really cool if I'd done something clever and made it that it hadn't been Dean-and-Cas at all, but it just seemed like that and it had really been Dean-and-someone-else and Cas-and-someone-else, and Dean and Cas weren't in the same town and didn't know each other and had nothing to even do with each other.

But it was too late by then and I can't be bothered to rewrite it and I don't think I'm that clever anyways. And besides, I like this.


End file.
